JoJo's Bizarre Adventure HD Ver. Review

JoJo's Bizarre Adventure is a fighting game developed and published by Capcom. The
original game entitled "JoJo's Venture" was released in North American arcades
back in the 1990's and then an upgraded version of that fighting game entitled "JoJo's
Bizarre Adventure" was released for PS1 and Dreamcast later. JoJo's
Bizarre Adventure is made by the same team that developed Street Fighter III and
its many incarnations, so the animation is very fluid. This HD version of JoJo's
Bizarre Adventure is now available on Xbox 360 and PS3 for the asking price of
1600 points or $19.99 respectively.

JoJo's Bizarre Adventure is based off a Japanese manga of the same name. This
long running manga series also spawned a six volume OVA anime series and later a
seven volume anime series. The video game fighter focuses mainly on the first
OVA series that was released. The main storyline is taken right from that
series. The plot of the game deals with the Joestar family's continued struggle
against the vampire Dio Brando. Jotaru is the current youngest member of the
Joestar family and the main character for the game. Jotaru and all of his allies
wield a spiritual apparition known as a "Stand" that they can control and call
upon during battle. When Jotaru's mother develops a Stand that feeds on her life
force to manifest itself, Jotaru and his friends set out on a quest to find and
kill Dio in order to save his mother and the Joestar family.

JoJo's Bizarre Adventure HD has a roster of 22 fighters. The selectable
fighters are Jotaro, Avdol, Iggi, Mahrahia, Midler, Joseph, Kakyoin, Dio,
Polnareff, Alessy, D'bo, Iced, Hol Horse, Black Polnareff, Petshop, Chaca,
Shadow Dio, Kan, New Kakyoin, Hol Horse & Voing, Robber Soul and JoJo (Young
Joseph). Each fighter also has five palette swap colors. This version is
basically equivalent to the Dreamcast version of JoJo's Bizarre Adventure. The graphics are in
full HD this time. The screen can be displayed in a 4:3 or 16:9 ratio. Art from
the JoJo manga is displayed on the sides of the screen to cover its borders.
There is no way to stretch the screen to cover the borders.

Along with a light, medium and heavy attack, there is also a "stand" button
in JoJo's Bizarre Adventure. This button can be used to control each fighter's
stand in various ways. Each fighter has some sort of spiritual presence or
attack that can be used with the stand button. Some of the characters are
different versions of existing characters, but the majority of the characters
are unique in their own way. Black Polnareff is Polnareff possessed by a demon
and he plays quite different from the original Polnareff. Characters such as Hol
Horse & Voing only change a single super move when compared to the original Hol
Horse however, but the majority of the cast has more differences.

JoJo Bizarre Adventure plays much like a Street Fighter game. Some of the
characters can separate their stands from their body and actually control their
stand from a distance. A character such as D'bo fights while his stand (a demon
doll) remains on the ground at all times. Some characters only have an extra
attack for their stand such as Shadow Dio who will summon forth a white version
of his stand (The World) to charge forth with a few punches before it
disappears. Chaca fights with a sword once his stand button is tapped. The
majority of the characters that were added after the first version of JoJo's
Bizarre Adventure (upgraded arcade version) don't have a stand like the original
few do.

For single player, the game has a story mode, challenge mode and training
mode. The story mode allows a player to choose one character then fight through
several opponents to see that character's story. The stories for each character
are deeper than most fighters since this is based off the manga series. Jotaru
along with his friends and a few other characters that are mainly associated
with the original JoJo anime are given the most story in the story mode. The
challenge mode allows a player to level up while fighting through several
opponents. The player can choose to have a certain boosts at the end of each
battle. The challenge mode is mainly for ranking purposes based on your achieved
level. The training mode is the usual training mode that just about any fighter
has where you can practice against another character.

For multiplayer, the game has an in-game fight request that can be turned on
in order to challenge other players while playing single player mode. The game
also has a ranked and public match option along with a lobby option. All the
matches I played online were lag free - and I was fighting Japanese players,
which goes to show that the online works really well! Players can record matches
and upload their matches to the replay leaderboard. All replays can be viewed
and several options such as hit boxes and controller inputs for each player can
be displayed in order to see the specifics of each match. The multiplayer is
basically the majority of the replay value in JoJo's Bizarre Adventure since the
single player is pretty shallow overall. If you don't intend on playing this
game online, it will get old very quickly.

The overall graphics for the game look just as good as Street Fighter III in
HD for the most part. The game is colorful and very fluid. The game is full of
action and a variety of strange stuff from the manga. Dio's blood is still
censored just like in the original game. The sounds for the game seem slightly
muffled at times when it comes to character sound effects, but the game still
sounds great overall. All of the "ORORORORORORORO" and "MUDAMUDAMUDAMUDA" of
Jotaro and Dio's stands take me back to my arcade days.

JoJo's Bizarre Adventure is one of more unique Capcom fighters out there. It
will appeal to a fan of the JoJo manga and anime series the most, but it's
overall a decent fighter as well. Fans of the JoJo manga will get the most fun
out of the game since there are several references to the anime spread
throughout the moves for each fighter - such as Dio smashing opponents with a
steamroller and New Kakyoin leaping into the background to fire projectiles with
his Hierophant Green stand. Overall, JoJo's Bizarre Adventure is about as deep
as a King of Fighters game. The single player doesn't have much to offer aside
from the story of every selectable fighter. All characters and options are
available from the start, so there is nothing to unlock. If you want replay
value in JoJo, multiplayer is where you will find most of it.

The Good:
+ HD graphics
+ Stand gameplay is very unique
+ Decent cast of selectable fighters for a downloadable game

The Bad:
- Lack of replay value outside of multiplayer
- It's hard to fully appreciate without knowledge of the anime or manga

Final Rating: 75%. JoJo fans can now feel free to stop shouting "Za Warudo" to stop time since JoJo's Bizarre Adventure has finally arrived in HD!